Out of the millions of immigrants who fight to come to the U.S. every year, retired boxer Ignacio Orestes Salazar Batista finally won the match.

It began many years ago in his hometown of Holguin, Cuba. Salazar’s cousin was going to the gym to spar, and Salazar, then 15, went along in case he needed to defend his cousin. He was afraid the more experienced boxer would try to do more than just box.

At the gym, Salazar was asked if he would like to put on gloves to spar. He had never seen boxing before, but he geared up for a loss that would lead to a career he never imagined.

The smell of seawater washes over an 11-year-old girl like waves on a beach. The aroma is losing a battle to the smell of fresh flan from her grandmother’s kitchen. It is Sunday and Beatriz Cano Diaz’s family has gathered as it does every week at her father’s family home in Cuba.

“We would go to church in the mornings,” Cano Diaz recalled. “After that, we would come back to my grandma’s house. My parents and the adults would all be drinking. It was a good time … but we had to leave, for different reasons.”